Opinions and perspectives on current LiFePO4 battery brand choices for off-grid

Actually I changed the LVCI half a volt higher after this event. I heard the Victron beeping but didn't out of bed. The Phis would rebound and wake up the inverter and well pump/fridge/freezer/whatever would power up, run 5 minutes and the system would shut down again. It was really annoying.

I had heard of over discharge problems to LFP04 and self shut down but it didn't sink in until this thread. If that happened to me I'm not sure what I'd do now to get 'em back up. Years ago I bought a miracle power supply (Amazon, free shipping) that produced 12/24/36/48 vdc and the output was selectable to low/med/high but that only produced a stair step of higher voltage over nominal. It is a really heavy box. The first one failed at 1st use and it was replaced immediately. The 2nd is almost never used. It's just a power supply and is not regulated. So you don't plug in any battery and forget about it. So y'all have given me something to think about and watch.

When I commissioned the 3.8-48 Phis I read to fully charge each before use and them connect them together. The original three were from the same batch and were within a tenth of a volt so I didn't think further about it. After learning about them I now know how important that advice was and why - relative to Phi resting voltage curves, SOC, etc. When I added the fourth after 2 months later and I was still learning. All I did was run the bank down, let it rest until it matched the new addition and hooked 'em up. God does indeed protect the stupid. I had no idea of the flatness on the voltage curve and the SOC variance that could be in each block.

For the SimpliPhi blocks over two+ years I learned that their charging specs are really conservative. Even with the bolded and harped upon max on 56.4 and no Absorb they can be run up much further and not be a risk (except to your warranty if needed/claimed). So all has worked out fine over time and obviously they synced together - with their separate BMS's  and no interconnection to charging sources.

I really do think a closed loop with charging sources is the wave of the future and here now. And it's still evolving. So to this thread, if someone is thinking to change over to whatever lithium variant... I couldn't be more enthusiastic. But throw away everything you thought you knew about batteries. Anyway, my rant.

What I'm still kicking around is float. They say 54,4 but that is 100%+. They don't want you to be at an extended full charge. I have it at 53.4 and that is still 100%. As summer comes on with the long days this is a non-issue except for float. But it is an issue. Once the batteries are charged and floating they can be hovering at that for eight hours. The manual says they're not off 100% until they get below 52.5. At the same time they say NOT to keep your blocks at 100%.

I get it... The precaution is max voltage. Don't exceed it and don't absorb at that voltage and certainly as short as possible. But little is said about float time and float voltages. In the summer I can easily do any float because the days are so long. The winter is different. So I have summer and winter settings. And I am here to say, regardless of SOC stuff, a bank charged to its upper limit lasts a lot longer than to the lower even though they are supposed to be 100% SOC by voltage.

One thing is for sure to me - and that is if you can excess lithium battery capacity you won't have to worry about jump starting if they get too low. And ya can trim the top so you don't always have to max them out. You stay in the middle range where they are happy and supposedly last a long time. And that's what I want. I don't want to replace batteries any time soon.

Any thoughts?